WDCV INTERVIEW

Hey everyone. Here's an interview that the nice folks over at WDCV conducted with me last week in case you're interested:

WDCV: What is your sign?
D: Sagittarius

WDCV: Who is your favorite Beatle?
D: John Lennon

WDCV: What’s the last thing you listened to in the car?
D: Panorama by Birds & Batteries

WDCV: How did you first get into playing music?
D: When I was in middle school in Louisville, KY I started going to lots of local underground punk rock shows, which is where I first felt the desire to create my own songs and perform them. So many amazing bands came out of that scene in the early 90s that I count myself very fortunate to have seen: Slint, Endpoint, Crain, Sunspring, the list goes on and on and on. It was a special time in Louisville music history to be sure…

WDCV: What is the songwriting process like for you? What are you most inspired to write about?
D: I usually find a chord structure and then choose words that seem appropriate. As far as what inspires me, it obviously depends on what has recently transpired in my life, how I’m feeling at that particular point in time, and what I feel called to expound upon – lately it’s been the search for truth and asking questions about the meaning of life.

WDCV: Who are your greatest musical influences?
D: There have been so many over the years, but a very short list would include Talking Heads, Neutral Milk Hotel, Prince, Peter Gabriel, Fugazi, The Magnetic Fields, Cole Porter, Uncle Tupelo, John Lennon, Brian Eno, King Crimson, Richard Buckner, Slint, Nina Simone, Modest Mouse, Steve Earle, Little Richard, Oingo Boingo, Vic Chesnutt, Freddie King, Sunspring, The Gourds, Dan Bern, Minor Threat, Sam Cooke, The Cure, Howlin’ Wolf, and George Gershwin.

WDCV: Here at WDCV we are famous for our bluegrass show (no, really), and we heard a rumor you have some bluegrass in your past. Is that rumor true? Is that something that still influences your music?
D: Oh absolutely – I love bluegrass music. In my opinion it has a lot of rhythmic similarities to punk rock, so perhaps the bands from my early Louisville days paved the way. I’d love to make a bluegrass album someday actually.

WDCV: Where is your favorite place to play live?
D: Anywhere people come to see me…

WDCV: Calm seems like it has a very different sound from your previous releases. Is there a story behind this change? How do you think your sound will evolve in the future?
D: The songs on my previous EP, By The Numbers, were primarily written on a computer – they were very rigidly structured and laden with effects. The opposite was true on Calm, which was written mostly late at night in the tiny confines of my basement apartment in New York – I guess it was a way of bringing myself into balance with the multitudinous activity of the city that surrounded me.

WDCV: Along those lines, you also have a release called “By the Numbers” with songs called “The Golden Ratio” and “Easy as Pi.” Are you, sir, a not-so-secret math nerd?
D: Well it’s true that the study of mathematics is something I’ve always been fascinated with since I was very young – I believe most musicians possess some basic connection to numeric qualities, although it must vary from person to person. Aside from the meaning we attach to emotion, I believe that there is definitely truth in numbers too…

WDCV: Do you have any big future plans for the world of music?
D: I’m going to rob all the major labels and distribute their assets evenly to every independent musician in the world.

WDCV: State your life philosophy in seven words or less.
D: Be nice. Keep learning. Don’t panic.

WDCV: Okay, Bonus Question: If you had to choose between being a deciduous tree and a coniferous tree, which would you choose and why?
D: That’s an amazing question. It would depend on many factors, but if I absolutely had to choose, I’d be deciduous. I’d be ugly in the winter, but who’s beautiful all the time, right?